Israel’s military said its air force struck the intelligence headquarters of Hezbollah’s Syrian branch in an attack on Damascus on Monday, a war monitor said, killing two people.
It was a rare approval of an attack against Syria by Israeli officials.
The army has stepped up attacks on targets in Syria since launching a war against Hezbollah in neighboring Lebanon more than a month ago.
The warplanes “conducted air operations and struck Hezbollah terrorist targets related to Hezbollah’s intelligence headquarters in Syria,” the military said in a statement.
The Syria branch “comprises an independent intelligence gathering, coordination and assessment network”, the military said, adding that the attack was aimed at reducing Hezbollah’s intelligence capabilities.
The Britain-based war monitor Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Israeli strikes killed two Hezbollah members near the Sayyida Zaynab area south of Damascus, home to a Shiite sanctuary protected by pro-Iran groups.
The Observatory said the attacks targeted a house in a field “used by members of Hezbollah and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.”
The Syrian Foreign Ministry condemned the attack, saying it targeted “civilian areas” south of Damascus and caused significant material damage.
There was no mention of the number of casualties.
Syrian state media said the attack occurred at around 5:18 pm (14:15 GMT) and came “from the direction of the occupied Golan Heights”.
Mehdi Mahfouz, a 34-year-old resident of the area, said he heard “three consecutive explosions, one of which was very strong”.
“Then I saw a big black cloud of smoke rising,” Mahfouz said.
An AFP photographer said explosions were heard in the Damascus suburb of Jarmana as ambulances headed to the area.
Since the Syrian civil war began in 2011, Israel has carried out hundreds of strikes there, mainly targeting army posts and Iran-backed militias, including Hezbollah.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
